Baby Makes Two / In California, the teenage pregnancy rate is the highest in the nation. And experts say we haven't seen anything yet.

Harriet Chiang, Chronicle Staff Writer

Published
4:00 am PST, Sunday, March 8, 1998

Amber Gauthier is in a hurry to finish high school. But unlike her classmates who plan to go to college or get a job, this 17-year-old junior already has a big part of her future sketched out.

She is seven months pregnant.

The Millbrae girl started having sex with her boyfriend when she was 15, got pregnant when she was 16 and will be a mom by the time she graduates. She will also be a single parent, because her boyfriend left her when she refused to get an abortion.

Her pregnancy may cause many to shake their heads in dismay -- a sense of waste, a future lost and years of responsibility for a girl who still has dolls in her room.

But Amber doesn't think of herself as helpless or irresponsible. She plans to go to college and get a job -- after she has the baby.

Naive? Maybe. But she is one of thousands of girls in the state each year who drift into pregnancies and are confronted with the awesome responsibilities of parenthood.

Sexual activity among minors has leveled off in the last five years, and studies find that more are using contraceptives. But in an era of slashed welfare benefits and eroding family support services, teenage pregnancy remains one of the most formidable problems in the country -- and one of the most intractable.

Teenage pregnancy has been a part of our history since colonial times. The pilgrims kept rosters of marriages in their Bibles and marked with a star those that were the result of an adolescent pregnancy.

But even today, armed with sophisticated studies and millions of dollars in research, we remain far from any solution.

The number of teenage pregnancies in the nation each year has risen to a million. Medical, health and social costs have strained already strapped public agencies.

The problem is especially acute in California, whose teenage pregnancy rate is the highest in the nation, the result of a combination of factors: its multiethnic population, one of the worst education systems in the country and the highest rate of children living in poverty.

Despite the drop in birth rates in 1996, experts say that California is on the verge of a teenage population boom that will send its pregnancy rate soaring. By 2005, the state's adolescent population is expected to increase by 34 percent.

The costs, financially and socially, could be overwhelming for the state.

Almost $7 billion in state and federal money is spent in the state each year on public assistance -- welfare, Medi-Cal and food stamps -- for families arising from teenage pregnancies.

California is pouring a record $180 million into an array of programs including after-school clubs and financial incentives to keep girls in school once they get pregnant and have their babies.

Television commercials urge parents to get involved, billboards warn men that it is a felony to have sex with an underage girl, and millions of dollars are spent on programs advising teenagers to "Just say 'No.' "

But even with scores of studies, experts remain baffled by the relentless trend of girls who forsake their childhood by getting pregnant.

Surveys offer us a few clues. More than 80 percent of adolescent births are unintended. And poverty, lack of education and culture are unmistakable factors.

But experts remind us that during their teenage years, girls are also struggling with low self-esteem, peer pressure to have sex, and an astonishing degree of ignorance and passivity.

Rather than heaping attention on girls after they get pregnant, experts suggest that we could save millions of taxpayer dollars and years of heartache for teenagers and their families by paying more attention to them before they start having babies.

Students at
Peninsula Continuation High School
in San Bruno crowded in front of the snack bar, where the daily special was pizza at 75 cents a slice. Amber bought a salami sandwich, crossed the courtyard where kids were gathered in bunches, and found a quiet corner to herself.

On a gray winter day, Peninsula High School is a dreary place, a square building with bare walls and metal doors.

The school is full of outcasts, kids who have skipped or failed classes and need to pick up some fast credits. Amber transferred from another school in San Bruno last fall because the school has a nursery where she can take her baby while she attends classes.

Her family lives in Millbrae, in a one-story yellow stucco home within walking distance of a corner mall. Both her parents work at an electronics company, where her father assembles parts. Ten people are crowded into the modest house -- Amber and her parents, as well as her two older brothers, a friend of theirs and her older sister, who recently moved back in with her two sons, ages 1 1/2 years and 6 months old.

Amber could be mistaken for any other girl at school, her hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. She wears long baggy jeans and frosted brownie lipstick. "It smells like brownie, it tastes like brownie. It gets nauseating after a while," she confided.

But there is a sense of isolation about her and an awkwardness, as she keeps to herself, as if preparing for the uncertain transition from teenager to mother.

Her sweatshirts are getting bigger and her pants looser to make room for her expanding waistline. Occasionally, she absentmindedly rubs her stomach. "It's kicking," she said with a slight smile.

She knows many of the other students here but has few friends. "They're old enemies," she said, referring to a feud back in junior high school, when some girls objected to the colors she wore to school, the kind of silly dispute that only teenagers would care about.

In class, she keeps her head buried in her books, rarely talking to others and never speaking up.

Amber occasionally talks with her ex-boyfriend but admits that she never mentions her pregnancy to him.

"It's just not a topic we talk about," she said. "But it's OK. I can do it myself."

The boyfriend seemed to spell trouble from the beginning, the kind of guy some girls are inexplicably drawn to. After being suspended several times for getting in fights, he was expelled from school.

Now 15, he attends a special class at Peninsula High where he is not allowed to talk with other students.

They met three years ago. "He was the first guy I ever had sex with," Amber recalled.

They knew about birth control and the risk of getting pregnant. But that didn't stop them from having unprotected sex.

It turned out to be a fateful mix -- a seemingly loving boyfriend, a lack of planning or awareness and a blind belief that it could never happen to her -- that led to an unplanned pregnancy.

"We didn't want to use protection, so I was taking a major chance," admitted the soft-spoken teenager.

Last September, she started feeling queasy and took a home pregnancy test one morning before she left for school.

Two blue lines appeared, indicating that she was pregnant. "I thought 'Wow!' " she recalled. "And I cried."

"You're going to get an abortion, right?" her shocked boyfriend said when he heard the news.

"Yeah, don't worry about it," she replied.

But an abortion didn't "feel right" to her. Much to her surprise, her parents, who knew she was having sex, were supportive, leaving the decision up to her.

Like any other expectant mother, she has tried to include more milk in her diet, eating chocolate ice cream when she craves sugar. She no longer eats just one meal a day -- "I used to be real skinny" -- and chews on gummy bears when she feels dehydrated.

After school, she likes to shop for baby clothes with her best friend. But their trips to the mall are rare, because the friend's mother says that Amber is a bad influence because she didn't get an abortion.

Amber walked down the school hallway and opened the door to the nursery.

Two wiggly babies were lying on a quilt on the floor, while a toddler stood gingerly nearby, hand out, in case he toppled over.

Amber has lost a boyfriend and the comforting presence of her best friend, and is enduring the anguish of a new school. But at 17, she reveals a wisdom beyond her years as she begins to plan for the next phase of her young life.

"At times I'm scared," Amber said, as she stood watching the babies kick and fuss. "It's not so much about giving birth," she said. "It's like a huge responsibility that I'm going to take care of."

Despite the overwhelming prospect of raising a child, Amber doesn't feel the pressure or the need to get married. "Maybe in the future, but not right away," she said, admitting that she still cares for her ex-boyfriend.

"I love him, but since I'm so young, I wouldn't know if it's real or not."

The bell had barely begun to ring when students bolted out of classrooms and poured into the noisy hallways at Oakland's Castlemont High School. Nena Ensky let the others go by, then solemnly swung her backpack over her shoulder and made her way through the packed corridors.

Occasionally saying "Hi" to friends, she kept a steady pace until she reached a remote corner of the campus.

She opened the door and spotted a baby in a soft pink outfit fast asleep in a windup swing.

"She won't sleep good in the bed," said a woman who was sitting on the floor and juggling two crying babies.

"No, she won't," Nena said as she collected bags and a stroller and then scooped up her tiny daughter. "She sleeps with me at night."

At 16, Nena is juggling diaper bags and baby bottles with backpacks full of books. She is also pursuing dreams of finishing high school, joining the Air Force and eventually getting married.

Nena and her boyfriend, Rodney, have been together since fifth grade, ever since he started coming around to her house and she stopped slamming the door in his face.

Both come from big families in poor areas of Oakland, where fast- food restaurants are within walking distance and drugs are easy to come by.

She is the third of six children, raised by older siblings and now helping to bring up her younger sisters and brother.

"My mother was never around," Nena said. "She was working nights at nursing homes. She did everything." Her mother now takes care of Nena's father, who has diabetes and gets by on disability checks.

Nena said it was Rodney's idea that they have a baby.

She became pregnant when she was 15 and had an abortion because she felt she was too young. But when she got pregnant last year, she decided to keep the baby. "I couldn't go through another abortion," she said.

"I'm gonna marry her when she comes back from the Air Force," Rodney declared shortly before Nena gave birth.

Unlike many young fathers, Rodney stuck by Nena, accompanying her to Summit Medical Center in Oakland for her pregnancy check- ups and counseling sessions, helping her through 20 hours of labor and sharing in the parenting duties after their daughter was born in November.

She shows her feisty side as she describes to friends the night she went into labor. There was the anxiety and frustration after 20 hours of labor, and she was only 3 centimeters dilated. "I was laying hearing everybody else having their babies. I wasn't dilating," she said. "That wasn't fair."

When the doctors told her to give one more push, she said, "You must be out of your mind!" She laughed with her friends.

As she told the story, the baby began to cry in her arms. Nena's voice immediately dropped, and her face softened. "Do you want your bottle?" she asked her daughter, as she nudged a pacifier into her mouth.

Since the birth of Bri-Janae, Nena's life has been defined by her baby, Rodney and her studies.

She still lives at home with her parents in East Oakland, sharing a small room with her two younger sisters. There are two bunk beds in the room, a crib wedged near the door and stuffed animals and toys scattered about -- some belonging to Nena and her sisters and others for the baby.

She goes to school four days a week, picking up Bri-Janae at the end of the day from the school's nursery and walking home.

Most of the other young mothers are friendly, but a few aren't. "Don't you go touching my baby!" one warned Nena.

Every afternoon, when Rodney finishes his classes at the adult school -- he was getting into too many fights at Castlemont -- he comes over, often bringing her dinner.

In many ways, they are like any other teenage couple in love. She bakes chocolate chip cookies for him, and he is slowly teaching her to drive.

But Nena's rosy vision of having a baby has begun to fade as she have struggled with the endless responsibilities of being a parent, a burden shared by her parents. One day recently, she became distraught when she took her sick baby to the doctor only to find that she didn't have the money to pay for the visit.

She admits that she worries when Rodney goes out at night with his friends, out of their cozy family life.

The day before Christmas, a cousin of his was shot to death while standing on an Oakland street corner. And a few months ago, a couple of friends of theirs from school were killed when they crashed their car trying to avoid a police checkpoint.

Nena says they hope to move to a safer area in San Leandro once Rodney gets a job.

Despite her new baby, Nena is doggedly pursuing the goals she had before she got pregnant. She is a member of the school's ROTC and has already had a letter back from the Air Force asking whether she still intends to join.

"I could go when I'm 17, but I'm going to stay home for a year. I want to finish school," she said, nodding her head. "And I'm spending that year with my baby."

After that, she said confidently, it'll be up to Rodney to take care of their daughter.

If she can't get into the Air Force, she said, she's going to get a job at the airport taking tickets.

For now, Nena, who gets passing grades, is determined to graduate from high school next year. "Of course. I got to." Who's pushing her? "Me," she responds.

"They ask you, 'Do you have a high school diploma?' No, I don't," Nena says in a mocking voice, "but I did go."

"You can't get nothing without a high school diploma," she scoffed.

WHY CHILDREN HAVE CHILDREN

Dr. Claire Brindis has spent the past 10 years trying to devise a scheme to slow the relentless rush of teenage girls into unplanned pregnancies. The problem, she has found, is as complex as the tender emotional state of an adolescent girl.

The challenge of curbing the adolescent pregnancy rate is overwhelming in California, where each year about 65,000 teenagers give birth.

In a statewide study on teenage pregnancy released in November, the most comprehensive study on the subject in years, Brindis found that adolescents end up in unplanned pregnancies through a combination of cultural, economic and class factors.

"They have very few dreams, or, because of poverty, very few role models," said Brindis, a researcher at the University of California at San Francisco's Institute for Health Policy Studies. "Child-bearing becomes an attractive option." Few choose to give their babies up for adoption.

The projected boom in the number of teenagers in the state has lent a renewed sense of urgency to the search to find ways to stem the tide. By the year 2004, the adolescent population is expected to increase by 34 percent.

There is no cure-all solution, but Brindis believes that discouraging teenage pregnancy will require the long-term investment of a broad range of resources -- the coordinated efforts of state lawmakers, social and health care agencies, educators, community groups and parents.

The media, she suggests, should also make some adjustments in the images they convey. As they are feeling the pressure from boyfriends and classmates, adolescent girls are bombarded with messages implying that there's something wrong with them if they're not having sex by the age of 16, Brindis said.

"Teenagers don't know how to navigate these shark-infested waters," she concluded.

So far, teenagers seeking abortions have drawn more attention from politicians and policymakers than adolescents who choose to have their babies.

State lawmakers passed a law in 1987 requiring teenagers to obtain the consent of a parent or judge for an abortion. The state Supreme Court last year struck down the never-enforced statute as an unconstitutional invasion of a teenager's privacy rights.

But there are no such requirements for teenagers who carry their babies to term. And they, studies show, are more likely than adult women to have babies that are born premature or of low birth weight and require more medical care.

For every dollar spent in family planning and the prevention of adolescent births, the state saves $12 in health care costs.

Some politicians have claimed that welfare reform will help to discourage teenagers from having babies. But family planning experts doubt that the punitive approach will have much of an impact.

"We're trying to use welfare policy to do human engineering," Brindis said. "But human behavior is far more complex."

There is no doubt that poverty and social economics contribute to the state's teenage pregnancy rate, the highest in the nation. But several studies have concluded that race and the state's cultural diversity also play a part.

In her study, Brindis found that birth rates are highest among Latinos, and next highest among African Americans. These communities, researchers find, are generally more accepting of early childbirth and more supportive of young parents and their children.

Any assault on teenage pregnancies would have to take into account these cultural differences. But Brindis stressed that the culture of adolescence is also a factor.

Regardless of ethnic background, 85 percent of teenage pregnancies are "unplanned, unintended or mistimed," her study concluded. "They have very idealistic and unrealistic expectations of what's going to happen to them," she said.

Brindis believes that the problem should be addressed in elementary school, when girls are just beginning to get a sense of who they are and where they belong.

"Why can't we create an environment for these young people where there's a meaningful role that's separate from being defined by having a baby?" she asked.